


breath of a second coming

by HereComeDatBoi



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Adashi Gift Exchange 2019, Alternate Universe - Vampire, Developing Relationship, First Meetings, Human/Vampire Relationship, Keith is the best bro and also too tired for this nonsense, M/M, Mistaken Identity, Mythology References, Space Mom Allura (Voltron), Supernatural Elements, at least Shiro thinks it is, basically Shiro gets turned into a vampire, it's not though
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-12
Updated: 2020-02-13
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:14:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,771
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22677007
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HereComeDatBoi/pseuds/HereComeDatBoi
Summary: Shiro was finally getting used to being a vampire.At least until his brother's anatomy professor came along.
Relationships: Adam/Shiro (Voltron), Allura & Shiro (Voltron), Keith & Shiro (Voltron)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 18





	1. the beginning

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LittleRedPencil](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleRedPencil/gifts).



The day before his thirty-second birthday, Shiro was pretty sure he had his life figured out. He and his best friend Matt had finally gotten their research proposals through, his younger brother Keith was thriving at university and didn’t _seem_ to be getting into too much trouble, and his grandfather’s cancer scare had proved to be just that―the tests came out clear, and when he heard the news Shiro’s heart felt light again for the first time in over two months. 

Life was _suspiciously_ good, Shiro thought wryly as he and Keith started back home after his birthday dinner. _Too_ good. Nothing was going wrong, nothing at all―until a pickup truck ran the red light just in front of their house and careened into the left side of their car. 

Shiro was driving―and then, as luck would have it, he died. 

_Temporarily._

* * *

And when he woke up, he didn’t seem to be dead anymore. 

He was lying in a room so dimly lit that he could only just make out a grey ceiling above him, and something rough and warm was wrapped around his wrist―someone else’s hand, he thought, though he wasn’t quite sure whose it was. 

“You idiot,” said a voice from somewhere to his right: familiar, certainly, but more cracked and strangled-sounding than Shiro had ever heard it before. “This is all your fault. I hate you.”

Shiro only gagged in response. The parching dryness of his throat seemed to be twisting his body inside out, and after he made a few more desperate choking noises Keith passed him a plastic cup with a straw in it. 

“Don’t throw it up,” he warned, looking vaguely disgusted as Shiro drained the cup in four sips and wiped his mouth on his arm. “Allura said you need to finish it all.”

It was at this moment that Shiro looked down at his newly-stained sleeve and noticed three very important things. 

One, the room he was in looked more like a basement than a hospital room. 

Two, he appeared to be completely unhurt, despite just being in an accident that probably should have killed him.

And three, whatever he had just drunk was most definitely _not_ water. 

* * *

Shiro spent the next week hiding out in the basement he’d woken up in, under the care of his long-suffering brother and a young white-haired doctor who introduced herself as Allura Altea, though her slight hesitation when she told him her surname seemed to hint that it wasn’t her name at all―and Keith (who hadn’t left his side since Allura stole his body from the hospital) had apparently realized it too, and insisted on not using it no matter how much Shiro scolded him. 

“You shouldn’t, you know. It’s rude,” he remarked, watching Dr. Altea mix something up on the other side of the room. “She is a doctor, and she saved my life. The least you can do is observe common courtesy when you’re talking to her”

“I’m also the vampire who turned you into a demon and stole your immortal soul,” the doctor said absently. “Plus, Dr. Altea makes me feel even older than I already am. Call me Allura―or else.” And with that she shot her patient a grin that revealed a mouthful of pointed teeth, so Shiro wisely shut his mouth and said no more about it. 

On the third morning of his stay at Allura’s house, she and Keith sat him down and explained what had happened; after the truck hit Shiro’s side of the car, the paramedics pronounced him dead on the scene and sent him on to the hospital morgue, where Allura―the on-duty pathologist―quickly realized that he wasn’t dead after all. 

“Not completely dead,” Keith clarified, when Shiro gaped at them in shock. “Your heart had already stopped, and your b-body was all―but you leaned towards the passenger side of the car to protect me when the accident happened, so your head was okay.”

“Your brain was intact,” Allura cut in. “I couldn’t have done a thing if it wasn’t, but severe hypoxia hadn’t set in yet...so I bit you.”

“Why?” 

She blinked. “What do you mean, why?”

“Why did you save me?” asked Shiro, taking another shaky sip from the bottle of blood on the nightstand. “You’re a doctor, you must have seen people die before―and unless you turn _everyone,_ why did you turn me, specifically?”

“Because your brother looked ready to drink a gallon of formaldehyde if it meant he could join you,” she said bluntly. “There are rules about who we can and can’t turn, Shiro. We―that is, vampires―do better without too many of us around. We _are_ stronger than most humans, and we don’t age, but the fact of the matter is that we can’t live without drinking human blood, so going unnoticed is―”

“You gave me human blood?” Shiro croaked, feeling suddenly ill. “Did―did you―”

“I _saved_ you!” snapped Allura, eyes flashing crimson as Keith squeaked and hid behind the sofa. “God in Heaven, what do you think I am? There’s systems for us to survive around here―it has to be human blood, from a donor with the same blood type we do, or a compatible one. Some of it comes from samples after they’ve been through the lab, and some comes from blood bank wastage since whole blood only lasts about a month and a half. Your type was AB-positive, so that made it easier for me to get you some, at least. That was a unit of B-negative you had this morning, by the way, so if there’s an emergency in the future and you _need_ to bite someone anyone would work just fine.”

“I’m never―I won’t―”

“Vampire venom is a natural sedative, and you’ll never drink more than a pint at a time because your stomach couldn’t hold it. You can’t kill anyone by feeding from them unless you bite an artery or something, and they won’t remember anyway. And you can’t turn anyone without having your secondary fangs in them for at least half an hour, so you don’t have to worry about doing _that_ by accident, either.”

“Will I have to―to hunt, at some point?” he asked, dreading her answer as he had never dreaded anything in his life―or death now, he supposed. “Are emergencies, um, common?”

“They probably would have been for you, if I hadn’t been the one to turn you,” Allura sighed, pretending not to notice Keith sneaking out of the room with his fingers in his ears. “But I was, and I have access to all the finished samples from our lab, so you should be fine. And with you I won’t even have to keep track of what I’m getting, so that’s another plus.”

Shiro sat in silence for a while and tried to digest everything she had told him, starting at his almost-death at the intersection near their apartment and finishing at the fact that all the stories about “reformed” vampires surviving on animal blood were apparently incorrect. He tried to feel disgusted at the thought of needing blood to survive himself, but the disgust didn’t come; after all, no one was getting hurt to keep him alive, and it wasn’t as if wastage from blood banks and testing labs could be used for anything else. 

“What about my day-to-day life?” he ventured at last, twisting the hem of his pillowcase between his fingers. “I mean, everyone thinks I’m dead, right? Can I just leave and go back to work and move around in public, or…”

“Pros of working in a hospital―I’m in charge of the important paperwork,” Allura said dryly. “I shot the paramedics with a bit of my venom when I figured out you were still alive, to alter their memories. As far as anyone but the three of us is concerned, Keith was the only one in the car that night, and you were so drunk you wandered off and got lost on the way home from the restaurant you were at. Your brother told everyone important that you were down with pneumonia, so nobody suspects anything.”

He nodded. “That should have taken care of it, I guess. But―how did he deal with it? Realizing what you did, and why I wasn’t dead? I mean, he’s been here with you the whole time I was out, so...”

“He didn’t take it well at all. That’s partly why I turned you in the first place, because he followed your body into the morgue,” Allura said, lips going faintly pale. “Keith wasn’t hurt, but the ambulance brought him along anyway―he wouldn’t stop fighting them, trying to get to you, and I could sense that you were still there, just barely―so I pushed the paramedics out and told them I could handle him, and then I got to work bringing you back.”

“And he accepted it? Just like that?”

Allura winced. “There wasn’t time, so I sedated him and then brought both of you here. Your body was already on the mend by the time he woke up, and the whole...basement aesthetic was there too, so it wasn’t hard to convince him to believe me and let me do what I had to.”

“It just looks like someone’s living room,” Shiro pointed out. “I wouldn’t have realized it _was_ a basement if you had windows.”

“I redecorated,” she shrugged. “I had my late father’s weaponry collection down here before you arrived. And I had my turning fangs out when Keith first saw me, so he figured it out pretty quickly.”

Shiro’s heart gave a painful squeeze at the thought of what Keith must have endured in the ten days since the accident―first being in it, and then realizing that his brother was most likely dead, and then coming face-to-face with what must have looked like a nightmare come to life before realizing that Shiro would never be the same again. 

“I’m different now, right?” he asked, biting his lip as Allura inclined her head. “How―in what ways? How is it going to be, moving on?”

“You’re still human, technically, so not much is going to change aside from the blood-drinking,” she told him. “You can’t eat food anymore, or even consume any blood that isn’t human. It can and _will_ kill you, so don’t even try. Smelling or tasting it directly will make you incredibly nauseous, though, so you’d have to beat your gag reflex to actually get it down. You _can_ drink pure ethyl alcohol and water in small amounts, since your liver is still functional, but I wouldn’t recommend doing it too often. If you get injured, you’ll be completely fine within a day unless both your heart and your head are removed from the rest of your body, so if something happens get out of sight and lie low so no one can see the healing process and figure out what you are. 

“You will be stronger and much more agile by the time your first week as a vampire is out, so try not to give yourself away by lifting things you shouldn’t be able to―and you do need to breathe, and consume at least two pints of blood every seven days. As for the fangs, your canines should look completely normal unless you extend them to bite someone...and the turning fangs are hidden behind them in mature vampires, so you shouldn’t even be able to take those out for at least another year. And you won’t age either, so at some point you’ll have to relocate under a false identity―which won’t be easy, I’m telling you in advance.” 

“Is that everything?” said Shiro, dazed. “Don’t eat and don’t act suspicious? Because that’s all I really got from that.” He steadfastly refused to think about the last thing she had said―that he would eventually have to fake his death and leave everyone he loved behind except his brother.

“It should be enough for the first few months,” Allura acknowledged, somewhat reluctantly. “You’re going to be living with me until I can be sure you won’t blow it, anyway.”

“Thank you,” he said suddenly, reaching out and grabbing her hand where it lay on the covers next to his. “For saving me, and Keith. You don’t know what you’ve done for him―for the both of us. And I know it’s not something I can pay back―but if there’s anything I could―”

“There’s nothing I want, Shiro,” she laughed. “I’m a millionaire over fifty times over, and I’m as close to immortal as it gets. Not that I don’t appreciate the sentiment, mind, but what could you possibly give me?”

“A friend, maybe?” he offered, feeling suddenly foolish. “There aren’t many vampires around, you said, so…I could be there, and Keith too.”

Allura looked stunned for all of three seconds before patting the life-line running down his palm. 

“I think I’d like that. If your brother stopped running scared whenever he’s in a room alone with me, that is.”

Shiro burst into laughter. 

“He will,” he assured her, studiously ignoring the tuft of black hair hovering just out of sight in the hallway. “I promise.”

* * *

_“What’s wrong, Adam? Why are you still up?”_

_The young man standing by the window was looking out into the night as if he expected to find something in it, flexing the tips of his fingers against the glass until they were coated with drops of condensation. He did not seem to hear the girl who had spoken to him, until she sighed and called his name again, whereupon he turned around and sat down on the windowsill, sighing like the howling wind outside as he kicked off his slippers._

_“One of the souls in my domain died tonight,” he murmured. “A young soul, not even thirty-five. One of the spirits who wasn’t supposed to go. Not yet, anyway.”_

_“One of those? But there hasn’t been an unfated passing since over three years ago.”_

_“They happen a few times a decade, I know, but that isn’t what worries me.”_

_“Then what is?”_

_“Him dying wasn’t the strange thing. It’s that he’s still_ here _.”_

  
  
  
  
  
  
  



	2. the precipice

_ “So...you’re an honest-to-God, blood-sucking vampire now?” _

_ “Hey,” Keith snapped, poking Matt in the side as Shiro’s face fell. “It’s not like he chose it, okay? He was dead.” _

_ “No, I’m cool with it! I mean, I probably wouldn’t have believed you if you hadn’t taken out the fangs and all, but you look, uh, normal? I thought vampires were supposed to have white skin and red eyes and go around looking all...well, you know. You just look the same.” _

_ “That’s because vampires really aren’t that different from normal humans, according to Allura,” sighed Shiro, pulling Keith’s arm back before he could try poking Matt again. “The reason vampires drink blood is that our stomachs basically stop functioning when we’re turned. Our small intestines are capable of filtering harmful stuff out of the blood we drink, and then that passes straight into the circulatory system once it’s been purified.” _

_ There was a moment of silence as Matt digested this.  _

_ “Could you live on IV nutritional supplements?” _

_ Shiro shook his head. “My bones can’t make blood cells fast enough to keep me alive now, so I need the cells from the donor blood.” _

_ “But you’re the same in every other way except being stronger and having sharper senses,” mused his friend. “Plus the freaky healing abilities.” _

_ “Yeah, I suppose. I still have a heartbeat, and I run hotter than I used to, I think. Vampires can’t even identify each other at first glance―there’s no outward sign of it except the teeth, and those are always kept retracted.” _

_ “So you can’t go to the dentist anymore, huh? They’d catch the fangs on your X-rays.” _

_ “Well, it’s not like I’ll need to.” _

_ “...You got me there.” _

* * *

A year and three months had passed since the night Shiro’s human life ended, and he was finally getting used to it. 

When he came back into society―after six weeks of leave  _ recovering from his illness,  _ though really he spent the time learning how to cope with the near-constant sensory overload that came with having eyesight keen enough to pick out a ladybug on the pavement from three hundred feet away―he began to distance himself from his casual friends and acquaintances, as Allura had advised him to. After all, hiding the fact that he could no longer eat or drink from the people he was close to was impossible, which was why he had no choice but to tell Matt about the accident and its aftermath; the two of them spent most of their waking hours together in their research laboratory, and could pinpoint any irregularities in each other’s daily routines without so much as blinking. 

Matt took it in stride (though even Shiro wasn’t quite sure whether it was because he didn’t care or because his high-school cryptid mania had just come back with a vengeance) and even helped ease his family into it before Allura came around to explain. His parents accepted it too, and vowed to keep Shiro’s secret no matter what―which wouldn’t be hard, they assured him, since they too spent most of their time sequestered away in their offices. 

“I won’t tell, either,” Matt’s teenage sister had promised, indignant at being left out of the conversation. “But you have to give me a sample of your venom.”

“There’s no way you could collect it,” laughed Allura. “It degenerates completely on contact with literally anything that isn’t either a vampire’s moving bloodstream or a human’s. You can’t bottle it, or collect it, or do anything with it at all.”

Pidge’s disappointment at this was so reminiscent of the way she used to pout as a three-year-old that Shiro choked on the blood packet he was drinking and had to be slapped on the back until he stopped laughing. 

_ I’m not alone in this,  _ he thought, his body warming from head to toe as Colleen offered him a napkin to wipe his face with.  _ I’m not alone, and I never will be.  _

The sixteen months that followed had been surprisingly easy, though they weren’t completely without challenges; Shiro could no longer accept dinner or reception invitations from the other researchers in his department, or even go near the cafeteria without feeling queasy until Allura brought him an anti-nausea injection pen and told him to use it at as he pleased―as long as he didn’t forget and eat something by accident, she said, there was no point of him being sick whenever someone carried an open lunchbox or a sandwich by him. 

Life was monotonous, but it was safe. He went to work early to avoid meeting people in the hallways, came back home close to midnight since he no longer felt so tired after nine hours of data collection, helped Keith with his university assignments every now and then, and narrowed his social circle little by little until the only people he interacted with were Keith, Allura, the Holts, and the cashiers at the local supermarket. 

“You know,” Allura scolded one night when he stopped by to pick up his week’s supply of blood, “when I said be careful about who you interact with, I didn’t mean shut yourself away from everyone but your family.”

“This is how it has to be from now on, until I’m comfortable I won’t slip and give myself away,” he said gently. “I’m grateful for the advice, really, but it’s not going to be forever. Don’t worry about me.”

Of course, it was only at the end of Shiro’s self-imposed seclusion that everything went spectacularly wrong.

* * *

It started, as most things did, with Keith coming down with the flu and begging Shiro to turn in his homework for him. 

“Keith, you  _ know  _ me interacting with anyone from the university is off-limits,” Shiro sighed, chopping a scallion to put in Keith’s bowl of soup. “If I see them in passing they might try to talk to me again, and if they decide they want to be friends with me I’ll either have to start avoiding them or do something to make them leave me alone.”

“It’s just Professor Walia,” whined Keith, blowing his nose so loudly that Shiro winced and covered his ears. “He’s really nice.”

“That makes it worse,” his brother scolded. “If he’s nice, he definitely won’t ignore me if he sees me again.”

“Just leave it in his box and go, then,” Keith pleaded. “I already asked for an extension on this assignment, and I don’t want to disappoint him by―”

“Keith, you’ve got the  _ flu.  _ You told him that, right?”

“Well, yeah.” Keith looked absolutely miserable, and his Pidge-worthy puppy eyes made the effect even worse. “Um, I kind of told him Lance would be dropping it off...but Lance called this morning and said he was sick too, and Professor Walia said he’d have a care package for Lance to pick up when he left my homework.”

Shiro pinched the bridge of his nose. “So you want me to go talk to your nicest, friendliest professor because he made you a care package and you want it?”

“He went to all that effort already! And I saw what was in it the last time Pidge got really sick, there was tea and honey and lemon syrup and cough drops and snacks for when she wasn’t feeling well enough to really eat and―”

“Does he do this  _ every  _ time someone gets sick?” asked Shiro. “How does he afford it on a professor’s salary?”

Keith shrugged. “He’s just...like that,” he said in a small voice. “He knows how it is for the students, since most of us don’t have family around. I told him he didn’t have to give me anything since you were taking care of me, but he said he would anyway.”

“Oh, all right. I’ll go drop off your homework and get your package.”

“And can you give half of it to Matt at the lab tomorrow? He was going to bring some food to the dorms for Pidge, and she’s Lance’s roommate, so…”

“All right, all right. Finish your soup and try to sleep until I get back,” sighed Shiro. “And for the record, this is a one-time thing, okay?”

“Yeah, yeah. Now hurry, his office closes at five.”

* * *

_ It could have been a one-time thing. It  _ should  _ have been a one-time thing.  _

_ It wasn’t. _


End file.
